The soul of the moving picture (1924)

Record Details:

Title:
The soul of the moving picture
Date:
1924
Publisher:
New York : E. P. Dutton & Company
Volume:
The soul of the moving picture
Leaf #:
000173
Language:
English
Collection:
Books
Format:
Books
Contributor:
Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
Date Added:
December 21, 2023
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The Compass of Poetry 115 where the healthy feelings terminate. It is one of the wonders of peace that these impulses are common to all the peoples of the earth. The intriguing writ of the Asiatic soul becomes, in this case, clear and simple. Even the barbarian nations, the Negro, the Eskimo, the Moroccan, rejoice at the sight of our films with the joy that spells appreciation. It seems, however, that a great motion picture cannot be built up around peoples who are impulsive and that only. The characters of Hintertreppe were impulsive; those of Scherben were lethargic and animalistic. We were moved but not convulsed. The impulse in itself, and in its isolation, is uninteresting, for it is un-psychic. We sympathize with and feel the feelings after those who display them only when the impulse is raised to a passion. If we are to be captivated, carried off our feet as it were, the action has got to be strong; it must set forth not mere wish but will, too. Those elementary passions that spring forth from sensuality — that is, from the ensemble functioning of all our senses, constitute the field of mimic portrayal. The motion picture has as its goal the great and captive passions. And characters that are bound to earth, full of soul but in the plight of the unhappy Prometheus, make up the strongest expression of the art of the motion picture.